Super Mystère

Origins and context

Along the same lines as those that led to the Mystère IV family, the Saint Cloud engineering department started working on a new wing in mid 1953. The Mystère IV B’s fuselage was kept, and powered with a Rolls-Royce Avon RA 7 jet engine. This aircraft was successively named Mystère XX, Mystère IV B 1, and finally Super-Mystère B 1…

Super Mystere B1

In the middle of 1953, the Saint-Cloud design office started work on a new wing with a 45° sweepback angle at 25% of chord and relative thickness ratio of 6%. For the wing and tail unit, a new technique known as integrated structures was employed, based on machining very thick sheet metal and using titanium for the bolts and certain mechanical parts.
The fuselage of the Mystère IV B was kept and fitted with a Rolls-Royce Avon RA 7 engine. The resulting aircraft was successively known as Mystère XX, the Mystère IV B 1 and finally the Super-Mystère B 1.
The internally financed Super-Mystère B 1 01 first flew at Melun-Villaroche on March 2, 1955, piloted by Paul Boudier. The following day, Paul Boudier broke Mach 1 in level flight. It was the first aircraft in Western Europe to be capable of sustained level flight above Mach 1.

In the end, the Super-Mystère B 1 aimed at the export market didn’t meet with success, potential customers the argument that the French Air Force had not ordered it.

Super Mystere B2

The Super-Mystère B 2 was a developpement of the Super-Mystère B 1 but equipped with the Snecma Atar 101 G preferred by the Air Force.
After the good results attained by the Super-Mystère B 1 and in anticipation of improvements with the larger central plane of the Super-Mystère B 2 dont le plan central a été agrandi, Marcel Dassault began negotiations with the authorities to produce the B 2 in lieu of the Mystère IV B ordered 1954.
On March 29, 1955, the DTIA accepted and terminated the Mystère IV B contract, ordering:

The production order was subsequently raised to 220 and then reduced to 178, which were delivered between 1957 and 1959.
The Super Mystère B 2 01 made its 40-minute maiden flight at Melun-Villaroche on May 15, 1956, piloted by Gérard Muselli ; it broke the sound barrier without using its after-burner.
The first production-standard aircraft flew at Mérignac on February 26, 1957 and the first examples were delivered to the 10th Creil Fighter Wing in May of 1958.

Against a background of defense cuts, only 154 aircraft were delivered to the Air Force, of which two (under the name Super-Mystère B 4) were set aside as flying test-beds for the Snecma Atar 9.

In 1958, Israel ordered 24 Super-Mystère B 2. They took part in the Six-Day War of 1967 and the Yom Kippur War of 1973. En 1977, 18 second-hand israeli models, with new American Pratt&Whitney J 52 engines without after-burners were sold to Honduras.